Prepare the launch materials
Create a one-page book sheet
A single page with the cover, description, identifiers, formats, price, and ordering details is what booksellers, librarians, and event hosts actually want to receive.
Authors often hire help with this: design or production.
Why it matters
A bookseller deciding whether to stock a book, or a librarian deciding whether to order it, needs the identifiers and the ordering route more than the description. A one-page sheet delivers exactly that and can be forwarded to a buyer, pinned to a noticeboard, or handed across a counter. It is the document most likely to result in an order, because it makes ordering easy.
Your part
- What you do
- Do it. You normally do this yourself.
- Who normally owns it
- Author and Publicist. Publisher sales may supply a version; author keeps a current copy
- When
- 4 to 6 months before publication, once identifiers, price, and ordering details are final (Prepare the launch materials: six to three months before publication, before the first pitch goes out)
How to do it
The full walkthrough
A one-page book sheet, called a sell sheet or one-sheet in the trade, is the book's business card. On one side of one page it carries the cover image, title and subtitle, author name, a short description, the ISBN (International Standard Book Number) for each format, price, page count, trim size, publication date, publisher and imprint, distributor or wholesaler, and how to order. A short bio and one or two endorsements fit if there is room.
Traditionally published authors will often find the publisher's sales department already has a version, sometimes called a tip sheet or title information sheet. Ask for it and check the details. Hybrid and self-published authors make their own, and should be especially careful with the ordering information, because that is the part a bookseller or librarian reads first.
The sheet is a fact document, not a marketing flyer. Booksellers want to know whether the book is returnable and what the wholesale discount is. Librarians want the identifiers and the availability through their vendors. Event hosts want the price and the formats. Put those facts where they can be seen.
Keep a PDF (Portable Document Format) version for email and a printed stack for events. Update it when anything changes: a new format, a price change, a review worth quoting.
Common mistakes
- Filling the page with praise and leaving no room for the ordering details.
- Omitting the wholesaler and discount, which is the first thing a bookseller looks for.
- Listing the print ISBN only, when the librarian wants the ebook and audiobook numbers too.
- Producing it in a design program with no editable master, so a price change means starting over.
Identifiers for Create a one-page book sheet
Set a status on any record and it joins this step. All book identifiers.
| My status | Identifier | Why this matters | Yours |
|---|---|---|---|
| ISBN The International Standard Book Number, printed above the barcode. Most formats sold through the book trade get their own. | Every retailer, wholesaler, and library orders and lists your book by this number, and the title, contributors, format, price, and publication date attached to it are what those systems display, so one wrong detail shows up in many places at once. Traditionally and hybrid published authors normally receive the numbers from the publisher and check what is attached to each one. If you publish the book yourself, you buy the numbers and assign them, and you are the one who decides whether your imprint or a platform is recorded as the publisher. Keep one list of every ISBN beside the edition and format it identifies so you can check listings against it. | Add your ISBN-13 | |
| Ingram The wholesale catalog most bookstores and libraries order from, plus IngramSpark, the self-publishing platform that feeds into it. | This decides whether a bookstore or library can order your book through the channel most of them use, and on what terms, so when a shop says it cannot order your book this is usually where the answer sits. Ingram's data also reaches many retailers and library vendors, so an error in the record can surface in several places. Traditionally and hybrid published authors normally ask whether the title is in Ingram wholesale, at what wholesale discount, and whether it is returnable, since those are the two terms a bookseller checks before ordering; if you publish the book yourself, you set the discount and the return policy in IngramSpark, and both have real money attached. Get the discount and return terms in writing, then check that the title record matches the other major listings. | Nothing to record |
What done looks like
- One page, one side, readable at a glance.
- Cover image, title, subtitle, author, and a description under 150 words.
- ISBN, format, price, page count, trim size, and publication date for each edition.
- Publisher, imprint, distributor or wholesaler, discount, and returnability stated plainly.
- Contact details for the author and, where relevant, the publisher's sales contact.
- A PDF at a stable address and a stack of printed copies for events.
Ask your publisher
Copy this into an email. Replace the bracketed parts with your details.
Sources and last checked
- Official source
- No single official page for this step.
- Last checked
- Not checked against its source yet.
- How confident we are
- Verified